With all the attention for collective negotiations and pensions, and the situation surrounding the FNV trade union federation in particular, the KLM workforce is working especially hard for our customers this summer. And the figures reflect this. The KLM Group again generated strong traffic figures for July. In comparison with last year’s figures, KLM carried 170,000 more passengers in July alone (+6.1%). For Europe, the strong growth trend for previous months persisted, with 7.5% more traffic against a 7% capacity increase in July. The good news is that, thanks in part to the successful introduction of new European destinations – together with Transavia in the Netherlands – we’re regaining market share in Europe.

The Cargo business continued to face unrelenting challenges in July with almost 12% less traffic against a capacity reduction of close to 7%, resulting in a decrease in load factor of almost 3 percentage points.

Transavia NL continued with the successful replacement of (long-haul) charter flights with (far shorter) scheduled services. This generated a sharp increase in passenger numbers.

As a result, passenger operations once again reflect strong traffic figures for the busy summer season, showing that we’re heading in the right direction. I can see how hard everyone is working to make KLM a great company again. Within this context, “Change, Compete & Win” are and will remain key words for me. The necessary changes must be pushed through, however difficult this may be. Without this, we will not be able to achieve the margins necessary for a healthy future. And we must do so in order to regain our stature as a company with a bright future as well as a proud history. I am confident that we can achieve this together.

Proud of our history, committed to our future

CEO KLM Pieter Elbers

Amstelveen, 08 August 2016